Malpractice Woes: Here Is What You Should Do if You Get Sued.

This article relates the first-hand experience of a surgeon who faced 2 medical malpractice actions separated by 30 years and how each of those experiences affected him. The first episode occurred early in his career and caused anxiety, fear, and anger. The importance of getting support during a medical malpractice event, and the opportunities to do so, are discussed.

Growth kinetics of polymer crystals in bulk.

Temperature-dependent measurements of spherulite growth rates carried out for i-polystyrene, poly(epsilon -caprolactone) and linear polyethylene show that the controlling activation barrier diverges at a temperature which is 14K, 22K and 12K, respectively, below the equilibrium melting points. We discuss the existence of such a "zero growth temperature" T(zg) in the framework of a recently introduced thermodynamic multiphase scheme and identify T(zg) with the temperature of a (hidden) transition between the melt and a mesomorphic phase which mediates the crystal growth. The rate-determining step in our model of crystal growth is the attachment of chain sequences from the melt onto the lateral face of a mesomorphic layer at the growth front.

A thermodynamic multiphase scheme treating polymer crystallization and melting.

A comparison of transition and melting temperatures of n-alkanes with experimentally determined ticknesses and melting points of polyethylene lamellae shows that the variation of the thickness with the crystallization temperature virtually agrees with the chain length dependence of the crystalline-mesomorphic phase transition in n-alkanes. Mesomorphic polyethylene layers are stable objects up to the thickness set by this phase transition. The findings lend further support to the view that polymer crystallization generally uses a route which includes a passage via a mesomorphic phase.

Crystallization of poly(ethylene-co-octene): II. Melt memory effects on first order kinetics.

Dilatometric and X-ray scattering experiments of the crystallization kinetics of a sample of poly(ethylene-co-octene) show pronounced melt memory effects, i.e., the shapes of isotherms and characteristic times vary systematically with the temperature of the melt prior to cooling to the crystallization temperature.

Crystallization of a poly(ethylene-co-octene): I. A precursor structure and two competing mechanisms.

Observations of a sample of poly(ethylene-co-octene)in a polarizing optical microscope reveal peculiarities in its crystallization behavior. When cooled from the melt to a fixed crystallization temperature, at first a structure of diffuse appearance with variations on the length scale of micrometers forms rapidly. The transformation into the final semi-crystalline state then proceeds in two ways, by a continuous change of the inner structure of microm-sized objects and by the growth of spherulites.